I cannot start this report without thanking the mountain that hosted us all this past weekend. Thank you Mount Ascutney for letting us tread on your dirt, grass, and rocks and supporting us through the day and night! There would be no race without you.
Of course also thank you Northeast Trail Adventures (Justin Chapman and Eli Burakian) for ideating and executing this Backyard Ultra so well! I signed up for a few reasons, in no particular order: I love seeing vert pile up; I really wanted to meet more of the Northeast trail community; I was intrigued by the Backyard Ultra format; and Kevin signed up.
If you’re not familiar with Backyard Ultras, they operate as follows: every hour on the hour you start a “Yard” (typically 4.167 miles, but this race was a bit unique and only 2.25 miles, with lots of vertical instead of mileage); runners line up and complete the Yard on the hour every hour until there is only one person left (“last man standing”)!
Preparation
One of my takeaways from this experience is that really very little stimulus is needed to harden the quads for descending. Our only substantial vert stimulus in the prior 4 weeks, as Bostonians, was on a short local ski slope 10 days prior accumulating 6k vert of hard downhills in only 10 miles (aka fast and steep!!). Though that outing left our quads sore for 4 days, it was totally worth it because now, 16k of vert later, our quads are not sore at all. Yup… I was shocked too.
Huge shoutout to my calves and Achilles. Hills like this used to annihilate them. I’m talking burning, searing pain that would make me stop mid-hill. I think using poles for most of the loops helped, but still, huge kudos to my lower legs for putting up with this. A few years of uphill treadmill and flat pavement running has really strengthened them, more than calf raises ever did.
The Race
The race started generously at 9am on Saturday at the base of the 42nd Street ski slope. The race organizers were very creative and gave runners three options for Yards (i.e. what to finish within the hour): a set of 3 loops (the “short loop”), 1 long climb (the “long loop”), and 1 long climb with a little extra vert (the “vert gobbler”). They also gave out prizes upon accumulating the ascent of Mt. Washington, Mt. Whitney, and Mt. Everest.
The loop options were a super unique part of this race and made it extra fun! We opted to do all the shorter loops because we weren’t prepared to manage any ice and Kevin wanted to stick to one hill to make it more of an official Everest-like attempt (though the goal was only a ½ Everest). I do think the short loops were a good idea both metabolically and muscularly since this descent was a little plushier on some hay compared to the trails higher up. If I were to do this again without the goal of a true Everesting, I would start with the short loops and do some longer loops when I got bored with the short ones.
Anyway, for the short loop, we followed the ski lift to its intersection with the work road/“Fifth Avenue” and descended that. The ascent averaged 22% grade with an extended portion at 30+%, and the descent was a modest ~18% average grade. Each “Yard” was three loops, totaling 2.25 miles and 1209 feet of elevation gain. Honestly, I wasn’t bothered by the repetitiveness of the loops. I ended up doing 40 laps of this ski slope without music, podcasts, or any other distractions. Making some friends helped (see “Backyard Thoughts” below)!
It was nice in the cold weather to have the Outdoors Center for warmth between Yards. I was really afraid of being cold, but I was only cold once an hour on the hour, which was easily solved by jogging the first little bit up the slope! At this time of year there was also a lot of darkness, so 5pm felt like 10pm! I enjoyed the darkness, listening to owls and covering my headlamp occasionally to enjoy the bright stars.
Backyard Thoughts
The Backyard format was extremely interesting. My favorite part was that it felt very casual and grassroots. The volunteers were locals, participants showed up with their families, the start line was two cones. I also liked that it encouraged socializing. Everyone had 10-20 minutes between loops to chat, eat, regroup. And then when we would start on the next lap together there would be more chatter. I am very glad that I got out of my comfort zone and talked to some of the other participants. Everyone was super nice! Online, Northeast trail runners seem both intimidating and inspiring at the same time, and that was pretty true in reality too. Some goals I heard: time out rather than tap out, Everest, go 24 hours, go 72 hours, be able to go to work Monday…
I met quite a few runners, all relatively local. William, Tom, and Seth were doing the short loops with us — our passes and chats were like clockwork (and Seth ended up continuing for over 50 hours!!). We met Peter the day before when we went to scout the course — he gave us some Backyard tactical insights from running Bubba’s and inspiration for doing Jigger Johnson. Will was alternating some short and long loops — we chatted about medical school and his podcast From the Backcountry. And Lila sat across from us inside — she has a great Substack about trail running in the Northeast. It was also great to connect with them afterwards — William is making a Youtube documentary about this race!
I also liked that the waiting time between loops meant that I could eat real food without feeling rushed and without having any GI issues whatsoever. There was also a real bathroom with a flushing toilet. It kind-of felt like glamping.
On the other hand, I think I’m a bit too impatient for this format if I’m in a racing mindset. I just wanted to keep going and not be interrupted. I’m a girl of efficiency!! I felt like the “smart” thing to do would be to walk down the hill to preserve the quads to go longer, but walking downhill is no fun either!!!!! I think I mis-conceptualized this as a running race, when it isn’t: it’s a “Backyard Ultra” — there’s no “run” in that name! So, I’m not sure. I think I just would have to be in the right mindset to do one of these again.
Post-race
When Kevin decided to stop at the pre-determined stopping point, I was on board (after doing one more little loop to bomb the downhill :D). Our Airbnb had a surprisingly comfy bed. Plus, I don’t do it often (ever?), but it’s okay to stop when you’re ahead! I’m kind-of proud of that even.
The next day I was even happier with this decision, as I looked down at my legs: the cut on my knee from tripping at Rim to River a month ago wasn’t even fully healed; my left ankle that had gotten the anterior tibial tendonitis was red and swollen though oddly still pain-free; skin was hanging off from a couple toe blisters that still lingered from the 100-miler. These were good reminders that the body has healing timelines that I should probably respect. Bodies are wild though, like 2 weeks before the event I couldn’t even go for a 5-mile flat run without any anterior tib tendon pain, and 3 days after that I did 6k of vert without any pain… Anyway, I think my favorite part of all this stuff truly is training, and I wanted to get back to that!
In the morning, we went back to cheer for the 24+-hour runners. We also stopped at the local Brownsville Butcher and Pantry where we saw some racers and volunteers from the day before… great place for food!. We hiked up to the vert gobbler, which we hadn’t seen yet, and I hit the “That Was Easy” button at the top of the long loop. It started snowing up there, and the view was beautiful with Mt. Killington in the backdrop. I can’t imagine how it felt to continue past 30 hours, 35, 40, 45, 50, 55, 60 hours… and 3 of them are still going as I write this!! (Including Bill Tidd, who has a great FKT blog, and was definitely doing evidence-based smiling every lap. Also, update: Connor Brown did 90 Yards to win it this inaugural year!)
Overall, this was such a great experience, and I totally love at least this part of Vermont. I can’t wait to visit more, and we’re definitely entertaining the thought of going again next year! Final count for me for this year was 50k distance and 16.2k feet of vert. Would 110% recommend this event!!